


Trapped by Death

by Gem_Gem



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombies, Gen, Sentient Zombie, Zombie Apocalypse, Zombie Sherlock
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-09
Packaged: 2018-04-02 12:52:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4060744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gem_Gem/pseuds/Gem_Gem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I was in a zombie mood last night and wrote this. Not sure where it can go, but wanted to share it anyway.<br/>I rated it explicit just in case...</p><p>I both love and hate Zombies. Love to write, read and watch about them, but would hate if they were real. They can stay fiction, thank you very much.</p>
    </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I was in a zombie mood last night and wrote this. Not sure where it can go, but wanted to share it anyway.  
> I rated it explicit just in case...
> 
> I both love and hate Zombies. Love to write, read and watch about them, but would hate if they were real. They can stay fiction, thank you very much.

It had started out as an ordinary Wednesday. John had gone to work, seen a handful of patients, had his lunch with Sarah, and gotten back home early enough to warrant a stop off for takeaway, but as he made his way up to the flat he sensed something was wrong and paused, unsure on why he felt cautious and tensed until he spotted the droplets of congealed blood on the step in front of him. More blood droplets were scattered on the step above that, and the step above that, and John frowned in sudden anxiety, looking at a smear of blood on the wall and the handrail. 

With a cold feeling in his gut, John continued up the remaining, blood-covered steps, and pushed the door to the flat open, finding it unlocked and ajar, the handle smeared with bloody fingerprints. The air was still inside the flat and only served to make John even tenser. 

“Sherlock?” John called after a long, heavy pause. 

When no answer came he looked around, caught sight of the blood trailing into the direction of the bathroom and dropped the bags of takeaway to follow it with his heart in his throat. More blood was smudged up the walls and caked into finger-marks at the edge of the open bathroom door.

“Sherlock?”

John ran the remaining distance and pushed the door further open but halted in his tracks. Sherlock was standing at the sink, arms by his sides, and his head bowed. The sink was coated in blood; there was so much that the scent of it filled the air. The hairs on the back of John’s neck stood on end as he noticed a deep and oozing bite-mark on Sherlock’s right arm, and he frowned deeply, took a sudden step into the bathroom about to reach out to him in worry, but stopped again when he caught sight of Sherlock’s reflection.

Sherlock’s face was pale and sickly, his lips bluish and limply parted. Sherlock lifted his head slowly with a groan and John retracted his hand at the screaming in his head, frozen in place when Sherlock’s gaze locked onto him in the mirror. Sherlock’s eyes were bloodshot, irises bright and feverish with infection, and the emotionless look to them sent a burst of dread throughout John’s body.

“…Sherlock? Are you--?” John began before Sherlock turned slowly to face him, shirt bloody and unbuttoned, and bare feet dragging. He stared at John for a moment, head tilted oddly to the side, then he growled and lunged violently, baring his teeth.

John jerked backwards and cried out in horror when Sherlock gripped his coat, digging strong, lean, bloodied fingers into the fabric until it tore. John shoved him back roughly, watching Sherlock connect with the sink in an awkward and painful knock that had no affect on him in the slightest.

When Sherlock lunged again John backed up, dodged his long-armed swipe and automatically edged towards his room, “Sherlock! Sherlock, what are you doing? What’s wrong with you? Sherlock? Sherlock!”

Sherlock growled in response, cocked his head to the side, swayed, and then rushed John with a sudden jolt, gnashing his teeth an inch from John’s face as John held him back by the neck, kicking him in the stomach and punching him in the face. Sherlock’s head jerked aside from the force and he staggered, but didn’t relent and scrambled after John as he sprinted to his room and fumbled in his drawer for his gun.

John turned, cocked it and aimed it at Sherlock’s head as he appeared in his doorway, “Sherlock…Sherlock, stop right there! I’ll shoot you, don’t think I won’t! Sherlock, it’s me for Christ sake! Don’t you know what you’re doing? Sherlock, please, please don’t make me do this,” John bellowed, gun shaking in his grasp as Sherlock strode into the room with a malicious and hungry glint in his eyes. 

Shaking his head, John backed into the wall beside his bed and clenched his jaw, “Sherlock…Sherlock, please! It’s me! Don’t do this! Don’t make me fucking shoot you, you bastard!”

Sherlock suddenly stopped, eyed the gun, and then John with a rapid shift of recollection until it was gone in the next instant at the sound of Mrs Hudson calling John’s name. Sherlock twitched, turned his head, growled lowly and rushed out of the room towards her, blood from his arm splattering up the walls as he went.

“No! Sherlock!” John shouted and went after him without hesitation, putting the safety on and tucking the gun into his pocket right before he tackled Sherlock to the floor a few feet away from Mrs Hudson.

Sherlock writhed and snarled under him, flinging an arm out to claw the floor as he tried to crawl his way over madly, nails splitting from his efforts. John grunted and wrestled with him, gathering Sherlock’s strong arms in his grip and twisting them behind his back.

“Mrs Hudson, go into Sherlock’s bedroom, there should be a pair of handcuffs next to several badges belonging to Inspector Lestrade, bring them to me,” John ordered as he struggled to hold Sherlock still. “They’re in the second drawer, I think. Go and get them!”

“What? What is happening? Sherlock--?” She stuttered, eyes wide in terror, entire fragile frame shaking.

“Now, Mrs Hudson!” John screamed over the noises Sherlock was making. “Please, I have no time to explain!” 

Mrs Hudson jumped, clutched at her chest, and then scattered away towards Sherlock’s bedroom after John repeated her name several times. Sherlock bit at the air as she passed, and fought harder with endless strength, his body arching and bucking off the floor time and time again.

When Mrs Hudson returned John had her throw the handcuffs at him and he quickly snapped them over Sherlock’s wrists in a smooth and sudden motion. He got up then, grabbed Sherlock’s shoulders and heaved him up and onto the settee, punching him back down when he pounced. John then whipped off his belt and tied Sherlock’s legs together as tightly as he dared.

Like a wild animal Sherlock continued to roar and growl madly, gnashing his teeth and bucking his body until he fell off onto the floor face first with a loud thud. John watched him, breathing hard, and then picked up Sherlock’s scarf from the bundle of Sherlock’s bloodied coat on the floor, unseen until that moment. John tested its strength and then walked over, yanked Sherlock’s head up by his hair, and gagged him with the scarf firmly. 

John picked Sherlock back up, dropped him on the settee again, and stepped back to Mrs Hudson. Sherlock’s muffled growls filled the room and John screwed his eyes shut.

***

Sherlock grunted and pressed down harder on the wound, stumbling up the stairs and catching himself on the wall and the rail with slick fingers. Opening the door to the flat Sherlock peeled off his coat, yanked off his scarf, and dumped them by the door before he headed off towards the bathroom, kicking his shoes off into his room as he passed. 

The wound oozed suddenly, flaring with pain, and Sherlock gasped, falling into the wall and gritting his teeth. He gripped his arm as his vision blurred and then throbbed, brightening oddly around the edges in a flush of light. Panting through his teeth, Sherlock pushed onwards, clutched tightly at the bathroom door as it opened, and then stumbled against the sink.

He waited for the pain to ebb slightly and then looked at his arm. The skin of his forearm was torn and bloody, still leaking blood that trailed and poured to drip from his fingertips in thick droplets. The bite had been vicious and sudden, the jaw of the teenage boy who’d caused it had held in place firmly, like a pitbull, and Sherlock had to fight with everything he had to dislodge the boy, who took a chunk of Sherlock’s flesh with him. Afterwards the boy had chewed and eaten the piece stuck between his bloodied teeth and then jolted after Sherlock again with an inhuman growl.

Sherlock had sprinted from the deranged boy, climbing buildings and cutting through alleyways to lose him, all the time loosing blood from his arm and trying not to lead the boy into the arms of the public. Once Sherlock was sure he’d lost him in a back alley he had fallen against a chain fence and quivered in pain, looking down at the puddle of blood dribbling from the wound as he had pulled out his phone with the trembling fingers of his other hand. He had called Lestrade, described the boy and his location, hung up and made his way home to treat the wound and wait for John to get back. Sherlock hadn’t thought he’d need to go to the hospital and hadn’t wanted to.

He tried to check the time as he ran the taps, cleaning the wound to assess the damage, but his vision blurred again before he could note how long it had been since he’d been bitten and when John might be home. Sherlock blinked roughly, clutched the sink with both hands, and shuddered in agony with a shaking breath and furrowed brow.

“John,” he gasped, fumbling for his phone and only smearing the screen with blood as he typed a nonsensical message and dropped it into the bath. 

Sherlock stared at it, breathing heavily, and then twitched, arching when the wound oozed again. Suddenly hot, Sherlock unbuttoned the first few buttons of his shirt, loosened it from his trousers, and yanked off his socks.

“Mrs…Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock wheezed, trying to reach for the first aid box above the mirrored cabinet in front of him. “Mrs…Hudson…M-Martha…Martha!”

He swayed and gripped the sink, bending over it and staring at his own reflection in the mirror inches from his face. His skin was covered in a shimmering layer of sweat and was pale, worryingly so, his lips white. Sherlock squinted at the strange colour of his eyes and reached up to check them until his body seized up and he inhaled sharply, clawing at the rim of the sink as his heart stuttered, his muscles contracting and quivering.

“Oh…oh God,” Sherlock moaned, trembling violently over the sink, his knees buckling. “John…John…”

Glancing into the bath he stared at his mobile phone, squirming in what he suddenly knew to be his death throes, his toes flexing in a spasm against the floor as he gurgled and rasped loudly. Blood from his arm and hands stained the bowl of the sink as he flailed, covering the white porcelain red, and Sherlock tried in vain to reach for his phone again, his head knocking into the taps as he convulsed once, then twice, his spine arcing painfully.

Sherlock fought and grit his teeth, ignoring the slowing of his heart and the burning of his lungs as his body contracted in a surge so strong it pushed him further over the sink, his head banging into the wall. He whined and burbled with a rasping inhale and quivered fiercely.

When he suddenly went still he exhaled deep and long and slumped into the sink, waist balanced awkwardly on the edge and legs and feet limp. Sherlock blinked once slowly when his heart gave a feeble pulse and then twitched before ceasing all movement whatsoever. 

***

John walked back into the living room holding Sherlock’s mobile phone and shot the writhing, growling figure now bound to a kitchen chair a sad and grief-stricken look. The message Sherlock had tried to write was a mash of words with only John’s name spelt correctly.

“Jesus,” John whispered, voice shaking with emotion. 

Mrs Hudson was staring at Sherlock blankly, tears streaming down her face and a cup of tea in her hands that had long since cooled. John had tried to move her, but she had shaken her head and refused, her lips quivering. She jumped every so often whenever Sherlock would growl and groan and thrash, but did nothing more.

When Lestrade showed up he was overly worried and pale, and upon seeing Sherlock paused in the doorway, covered his face with one hand and then whipped his gun from its holster, aiming it at Sherlock with only a slight tremor.

“No!” John shouted, stepping in the line of fire. “No! Lestrade—Greg, don’t! Don’t shoot him, please--” 

“You don’t understand,” Lestrade replied, tone dark and cold.

“No, you don’t understand,” John said. “It’s still Sherlock in there.”

Lestrade shook his head. “No…no there isn’t.”

“Yes there is!”

“No there isn’t, John!” Lestrade exploded, making Mrs Hudson jolt. “You have no fucking idea what’s going on! There’s some kind of bloody epidemic! I’ve been dealing with this all morning; it’s everywhere! People are turning into…into monsters, practically ripping each other limb from limb and eating them! Eating them, John!”

John swallowed but didn’t move and lifted a hand in a calming gesture that only seemed to irritate Lestrade further, “Please…he is still in there. He recognised me. He paused. I swear to you…”

“John…no. He’s gone. That thing isn’t Sherlock anymore. You need to kill it and then I want you both to come with me,” Lestrade ordered.

“Go with you where?” John frowned.

“We’re leaving. Evacuating London. It’s spreading like wild fire and you’re not safe here, both of you. I came by to…to get you all,” Lestrade said, lowering his gun and letting out a wet breath. “Jesus Christ—He rang me!”

“…What?”

“Sherlock. He rang me. Told me some teenager had bitten him, was unhinged on drugs, though he didn’t know what kind; he gave me a detailed description, told me where he’d lost the brat and then hung up.” Lestrade explained, looking over John’s shoulder at Sherlock with a twisted expression. “I tried to get here, I tried so hard, but I just couldn’t! I couldn’t leave everyone, I had to…I had to—Shit. John, please…please, it’s not Sherlock anymore. I’ve seen the change with my own eyes, they are an empty shell of who they used to be; there is no recollection, no sympathy, no anything! They just kill, relentlessly.”

John took several deep breaths and stared at Lestrade stubbornly, “No. No, you’re wrong. This isn’t just anybody, this is Sherlock, and he is still fighting this thing—whatever it is. He’s still in there…and I’ll prove it.”

John ignored Lestrade’s protest and turned around, walking up close to a wriggling and gnashing Sherlock, kneeling down before him. Sherlock strained and craned his neck, growling and howling, biting the air in front of John in a vain effort to reach him, chewing down roughly onto the scarf still gagging him. John watched him blankly and then sighed and grabbed Sherlock’s jaw strongly, looking Sherlock in the eyes.

“Sherlock…it’s me. Do you remember? It’s John,” He started, rising his voice over Sherlock’s incessant snarling. “Sherlock. Sherlock, stop this. Stop. Look at me, Sherlock. It’s me. It’s me--”

“John…” Lestrade sighed behind him.

John shook his head and leaned closer, digging his fingers into Sherlock’s cool skin, “Sherlock! Listen to me, you idiot! Listen and look! Look, Sherlock!”

Sherlock’s infected eyes shuddered and then snapped to John with a suddenness that made John flinch despite himself. Sherlock stared at John, his growling quietening gradually into an odd sort of purring vibration at the back of his throat. John loosened his hold on Sherlock’s jaw slowly and Sherlock tilted his head, gazing at John unblinkingly.

John half turned to glance at Lestrade and then boldly moved his fingers within biting distance of Sherlock’s mouth with his heart loud in his ears, Sherlock had strongly torn and ripped the scarf in such a way that biting was still be possible, even with the fabric frayed and filling his mouth. Lestrade inhaled sharply in objection and took a step forward but John waved him off quickly as Sherlock’s attention wavered. 

“No, no, no, look at me Sherlock,” John said, blocking Sherlock’s view of the rest of the room and taking his fingers away when Sherlock began to growl once more. “Look at me.”

Sherlock’s eyes flitted back to John after a long moment and, once again, the purring settled in at the back of his throat. John smiled wonkily at Sherlock and stroked his cheek lightly, tensing when Sherlock turned his face into his palm but forced himself to relax once Sherlock merely nosed clumsily at it. 

“Hi, Sherlock,” John whispered, gazing at the vivid colouring of Sherlock’s eyes as sirens blared down the street.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I need feedback on this, please.
> 
> Should I keep switching between Sherlock and John, or just pick one of them?
> 
> I think I will also be editing this story at a later date, to add more detail to certain things and lengthen scenes.

Sherlock’s vision was dulled and blurry, his hearing muffled and his body numb. He could see and hear and feel, but it wasn’t tangible, it didn’t feel real, like he was trapped between an unconscious and conscious state, receiving information from far away, as if from a dream. Sherlock tried to concentrate, tried to remember where he was and what he was doing, and why he was stuck in the position he was in, but his mind was abuzz with static, jerking every moment or two into a memory or a static snapshot of a part of his life. 

He tried to visit his mind palace and found it rundown and decaying, the walls, ceilings and floors filled with holes like gaping mouths filled with jagged teeth. Everything around him twitched as he walked down a deserted seemingly endless corridor, doors appeared and then disappeared either side of him, and a shadow of a man flashed briefly, right in his face, before popping out of existence completely. Sherlock suddenly turned and walked into a room with a frown, staring at the body of a dog crumpled in the corner that made his throat close up. He rushed over to it but a growl from behind him stopped him in his tracks and he turned to face himself. Another version of him was standing, hunched and twitching, at the doorway, fingers flexing uncontrollably and covered in blood, arms glistening and slick. 

The other him looked up slowly and then reached aside, touching the nearest wall with one skeleton finger, scraping a broken and bloodied nail down the white paint with malicious intent. Dark, oozing veins grew from the scratch left behind and covered the wall, darkening the paint with decay, and Sherlock watched as the wall crumbled effortlessly into rubble. 

“Who are you?” Sherlock demanded.

The other him smiled a vicious and twisted smile, teeth dark with infection, tongue black and dead, “Stupid question. You know who I am,” he replied, voice rasping and rough, a growl echoing off each word.

“No I don’t,” Sherlock frowned, backing up when the floor began to rot under the other’s bare and pale feet. “Stop this! Get out of my head!”

“It’s my head now,” the other him cackled, twitching his head aside in an odd tilt and reaching for the other wall. “And I’m renovating.” 

The wall crumbled, quicker than the one before, and Sherlock carefully walked his way across the rotting floor, subtly, but unwaveringly. An archway appeared at his back and he jumped through it into another hallway, looking back to see the room he’d hopped out of gone in place of a wall. Backing away, Sherlock glanced around and then ran as he saw the tendrils of mould curling around the boarder of the ceiling. 

Sherlock sprinted and turned right, skidding to a stop when he saw the other him ambling forwards with outstretched, flexing fingers and a face-splitting grin that suddenly showed all of his rotten teeth. Sherlock took a step backwards, and then another, before turning and running when the other him roared and lunged towards him, breathing heavily and growling. Sherlock turned abruptly and slammed a thick metal door shut, bolting it and stepping back as the other him hit and kicked and snarled on the other side, denting one part of it with a fist and then suddenly going silent. 

“Sherlock!”

“John?” Sherlock replied, spinning on the spot to face the barrel of a gun, held by a shifting and morphing shadow.

“Don’t do this! Don’t make me fucking shoot you, you bastard!”

Sherlock looked at the gun and then at the shadow figure quickly, frowning when the black, blank, head of it dissipated, like a smoke mask, leaking away to reveal the petrified, wretched, and resolute face of his flatmate.

“John…what?”

The metal door behind him creaked and Sherlock twitched and glanced back in time to see it all but melt, bending back and darkening and rusting to reveal the other him who glared with a low growl and leapt towards Sherlock, spraying dark, seeping blood up the walls and on the floor.

***

“We’re taking him,” John said, unwavering and uncompromising. “No arguments.”

“John--” Lestrade started.

“No, Greg! We’re taking him! You saw what just happened, you saw how he responded to me, you blatantly just witnessed that he remembered me, that he reacted!” John shouted, licking his lips anxiously when Sherlock growled behind him and strained again. “Greg, we either take him with us, or I don’t go.”

“That’s suicide,” Lestrade growled, quietening his voice when Sherlock flinched and howled gutturally, like angered, wild, dog. “You’d really risk your life--?” 

“Without question,” John interrupted, standing straight and strict. “I’d do anything for this man, you know that. He’s my…my best friend and I won’t abandon him when he needs me the most! He’s in there, Greg, trapped by this…this infection, fighting to get out. He needs help, he needs me.” 

Lestrade sighed loudly, turning his back and raking a hand through his hair with sporadic movements. Mrs Hudson was still scarily silent, her eyes glassy and mouth shaking, and John walked over to slowly touch her shoulder and cheek, crouching to check her over gently. 

“…He’ll have to be bound more,” Lestrade finally responded. “So he can’t do any harm to anyone else, or himself. I don’t know anything about this thing, I just don’t know—we need to go now though, right now. We can’t wait around any longer.”

John looked up and then brought out Sherlock’s blood-tacky mobile, going through a bunch of missed calls and unread texts that had been hidden by Sherlock’s unfinished message until that moment.

“We taking your car?” John asked softly as he scrolled through them with his thumb, smearing blood against his skin without a care. 

“Yeah, why?”

John grinned unevenly when Sherlock’s phone lit up suddenly in his grasp, and lifted it to his ear. “Hello Mycroft.” 

“John,” Mycroft replied, voice smooth and calm but eerily quiet. “Could you and Sherlock--”

“You outside?”

“…Yes,” Mycroft replied patiently. 

“Lestrade’s here, as you well know, and Mrs Hudson, they’ll both be coming with us. Then we go pick up Molly, Mike, and anyone else we can fit in that fancy car of yours, got it?” John told him, walking to the window to peer outside at the street, glancing briefly at Sherlock as he tried to follow John’s movements with a low, rumbling growl that made John clench his jaw.

Mycroft was silent a long moment and John swallowed, screwing his eyes shut, “John,” Mycroft whispered. “Let me speak with my brother for a moment, won’t you?”

“I can’t let you do that, Mycroft, no,” John replied, hating how his voice wavered. 

“I see,” Mycroft sighed and after another long silence, he hung up.

John was expecting the black car to move but it remained and with a sigh of relief John turned from the window and stepped close to Sherlock. Sherlock bit for him instantly but John grabbed his jaw roughly and leaned down to stare into his eyes until Sherlock looked back and calmed, purring in his throat once again. John smiled, stroked his cheek, and then examined Sherlock’s eyes, ears, head, and mouth with nervous fingers.

“John?” Lestrade asked expectantly. 

“Mycroft is outside. Take Mrs Hudson, pack some of her things, and go out to him. Then come back and help me take Sherlock down there, okay?” 

Lestrade looked like he was about to argue but the sound of shrieking sirens and screams in the distance made him exhale deeply and nod, slowly but firmly taking Mrs Hudson out of the room. 

John waited until they were gone before he inspected Sherlock’s injured arm, fetching the first aid box to press, disinfect, stitch, and then wrap it up securely. Sherlock didn’t react to any of it, merely stared at John with an unblinking gaze, snarling every few seconds and then softly grinding his teeth, fidgeting on the chair. John cleaned the blood from Sherlock’s twitching fingers blankly, rolling his sleeves down neatly and redoing his shirt buttons, and then pressed his fingers to Sherlock’s neck, checking for a pulse with a deep frown, combing his other hand through Sherlock’s fringe. 

There was a weak and slow fluttering beneath his fingertips that skipped a beat, stopped, and then beat again in an erratic, strange rhythm. John looked up into Sherlock’s face, tapping his cheek for his attention when Sherlock’s eyes wandered and rolled. 

“Sherlock…can you say my name? Can you speak, Sherlock?” John murmured, fingering Sherlock’s ear idly. “Sherlock?”

Sherlock grunted and then suddenly snarled, biting for John aggressively, struggling against his binds when John jerked back and stood up. Sherlock thrashed, roaring and struggling, knocking the chair aside with a crash. John watched him impassively and then walked out, packing a suitcase of clothes for both himself and Sherlock before returning, righting the chair awkwardly, leaning away from Sherlock as he strained to get at him. 

John scowled and then turned, randomly picked up the skull from the fireplace, stuffed it into the bag, and then picked up Sherlock’s violin case, eyeing it in consideration and then holding it out near Sherlock’s face, watching as Sherlock looked at it, sneered lightly and was unexpectedly calm, staring at the case with interest.

“Good. Stop making a racket,” John muttered, placing the case down on Sherlock’s lap to keep him preoccupied as John moved around the flat, packing away his and Sherlock’s laptops, more ammunition for his gun, and turned to look at Lestrade as he stepped back into the flat. “Could you fetch one of Sherlock’s belts for me, please.”

“What for?” Lestrade asked, halfway towards Sherlock’s room.

“Better gag than a scarf.”

Lestrade’s brow twitched, “I can’t believe we’re doing this…”

John ignored him and zipped the suitcase up, stepping over to touch the back of Sherlock’s head and then untied and pulled the shredded scarf from Sherlock’s mouth. He dropped the scarf and glanced at the bloodied coat in the corner of the door for a second, his eyes mournful.

***

“Get out of my head!” Sherlock thundered as he pressed at his temples and then clutched at his hair.

New walls, new doors, shot up around him, rebuilding the missing parts of his mind palace with a deep, and deafening rumble, pushing and fighting the secretion of advancing deterioration. The other him continued to growl and claw and gouge to get at Sherlock, destroying everything and anything in its path. Sherlock gritted his teeth and turned to the twitching shadows around him, he eyed them intensely, calculatingly, and then strode up to touch one of them, wiping and wafting smoke away from the face of Molly. Sherlock turned to the next one and then the next, disregarding the banging and the roaring behind him with a tensed expression. 

Sherlock stepped back and viewed the room full of familiar face, annoyed as they jerked in and out of existence, “What’s happening?”

“What do you remember?” Molly asked him.

“Nothing,” Sherlock snapped, pulling at his hair again as the banging and growling behind him increased in volume. “I can’t…I can’t think with all that noise!”

“Doesn’t it remind you of anything?” Lestrade inquired, and Sherlock looked at him abruptly when Lestrade’s voice came out rough and crackling, as if he were speaking into the receiver of a phone. “Sherlock, where are you? Tell me where you are?”

“What?” Sherlock frowned, cupping his head. 

“Sherlock, Sherlock stay on the line! Sherlock I need you to stay where you are, I’m coming to get you,” Lestrade said, face blank but voice filled with emotion, the background riddled with chaos. “Where did he bite you, Sherlock? Where?”

Sherlock shook his head in puzzlement and then slowly looked down at the sudden sensation of warmth on his arm. Blood was soaking through his sleeve, pouring over his wrist, and pooling between the creases of his fingers.

“Did he break the skin? Sherlock, Sherlock I need you to tell me!” Lestrade shouted, voice and face distorting.

The wall behind Sherlock darkened with mould sluggishly and Sherlock glanced at it, and then back down at his arm as Molly stepped up to him and undid the cuff, rolling the shirt sleeve up to reveal a deep, dark, oozing bite mark. 

“You didn’t tell him how bad it was,” She said softly, big, brown eyes borrowing into him. “Didn’t listen to him. Just ended the call and walked home, to wait for--”

“John,” Sherlock whispered.

“Sherlock! Listen to me, you idiot! Listen and look! Look, Sherlock!”

Sherlock turned sharply and was suddenly in the living room of the flat peering at John through a blurred and foggy vision. John recoiled from him and Sherlock cocked his head as he felt the tingling of John’s fingers on his face, noticing there was a thrumming, a deep purring, in the background that vibrated through his skull.

He could see Lestrade over John’s shoulder and when Lestrade suddenly stepped forward Sherlock tried to focus on him but was lost to a deafening growling and a dulling of his vision.

“No, no, no, look at me Sherlock. Look at me.”

Sherlock’s focus throbbed and then sharpened on John, drifting over his eyes, the crease in-between his eyebrows, and the wrinkles around his mouth. The purring vibrated through his skull again and he watched as John smiled crookedly, the feeling of John’s fingers at his cheek. Sherlock concentrated as hard as he could, tensed, and then forced his head slowly into John’s hand in response, trying to talk but failing.


End file.
